Title: Broken Open Author: Cameo E-mail: cameo@indo.com Archive: XFC, Gossamer, Spookys ok. Others, just tell me please. Rating: G Category: V Spoilers: Orison, Closure. Summary: Opening. Cause it's what happens after closure. Infinite thanks to Jintian for inspiring me to try, and for her amazing, insightful beta skills. And a Mark Anthony Disclaimer: If you're gonna sue me won't you tell me that, so I can hide my Hyundai and my yoga mat? Will you swipe my assets cause I like your show? Tell me, Mr. Carter, cause I need to know. Broken Open Heading up Wisconsin Ave in the late morning, dodging the bicycles and the stout men selling carnations at intersections, Scully knows what she wants. She punches the radio tuner with her right index finger till she hears the familiar sputter of "slowing at Vienna" and "backed up the Occoquan." She's not stupid. She may not be entirely self-aware, but it's clear that the traffic report affords her a kind of pleasure that few other things do. It's a specific pleasure, signing its name in a small space at the bottom of her lungs, as the street names spill out the speakers. Her mind registers each one, roads flashing red and blue, the colors acute in a small mental map that she constructs in perfect time to the litany. _Luck_, she thinks in a clean line, hearing that the Beltway's backed up from Silver Spring to College Park just in time to veer right onto 410. Now the road curves and she handles it: her breathing strengthens and blooms. On her way now, the route set, she continues jabbing at the tuner button, enjoying the quick shifts of her left hand on the wheel as she negotiates some pylons scattered in the center of the street. She's grateful for the curves, and the rapid clatter of routes and directions released when her finger stops on the next report. The feeling, she thinks, is definitely under the breath--the way orange tea hums in the lungs, even though that's not where tea really goes, and the way fingering the bruise on her right wrist makes it hurt below her heart. She faces the road, insists on turning when it does. There was an accident on this road just a few weeks back, she remembers. She'd unfolded the paper on Mulder's table the morning after Pfaster's death ("his execution," corrects Mulder in her head, although God knows the real Mulder would never say or even think such a thing), and seen the headline and the body count. She doesn't remember either. She remembers looking at the bruise on her wrist then, trying to study it, to prove something--trying to ascertain the angle of his thumb as it made the mark. Instead, she could only think _contusion_, the color of the word (blue and maybe gold, later), and what it means, what's broken open. She crosses Connecticut as someone hits the high notes in a French opera ("Impressionism," supplies Mulder's voice this time, even though she doubts he's a big fan of Tristan and Yseux), and realizes she's no longer letting a low voice count streets and water main breaks. Where is she headed? She thinks she doesn't care, as long as she can keep this rhythm, stay sane and safe with her hands at two and ten. As long as she doesn't get there. She is managing, she thinks as she changes stations again and taps her thumb to the wheel against the pressure of the new song, a wreck of drums and violins. She slams her finger against the button again, restless, avoiding. She's sure there's something to avoid here, though she knows better than to think that a newscaster's going to come on and announce Samantha's death. But it feels like news. And it feels wrong, not how it's supposed to--not that it's supposed to feel like anything, she thinks. _Not my sister_. But that thought just makes it worse. Scully knows it's what she wanted, this news. It's what makes sense, what he needed, what will make things right. But she's also aware that it's got her moving faster than she can think. It's insisting she distract herself. There's something about it she doesn't want to know. Her reluctant foot brakes at the light. What was it, she thinks, that happened after she heard him say Samantha was dead? She remembers relief, profound relief and a pain, sweetness, but there was more. For one thing, there was fear. The light turns green and she toes the accelerator as the words hit her, the desperate ones that surfaced silently in that blue dark as he looked up and away, always away from her: _You can't_, she'd thought. _You can't give up on us_. Us? When did she and Samantha become _us_? She shakes her head and stabs at the radio's off button. Enough of this mess. This is what she wanted. This is what they've worked for. She's impatient with herself now, and for that matter, ashamed. Who is she to feel abandoned? And whose grief is this, anyway? Sure, every girl her age played Stratego and hated her brother and was afraid when strangers came to the door. But Scully's a grownup now, and she's not the victim here. ("So you're saying," he intones, "not everything is about you?") She's sick of being the victim, she thinks, glimpsing the blue spot on her wrist. And she's got no place there now. But it's not just that. It's not just being left behind, which would be bad enough. As she signals and leaves the main road, she knows she's as much afraid of life without that search as she was of Mulder getting trapped in it. Samantha's absence had set limits, made things whole. Her presence as a solved, discrete sadness, leaves a hole in things. She doesn't know if she can fill it, if he'll want her to, or if that's even the point. She doesn't know how to think with everything so wide open. She's shoring up against something, she knows now. It's ruined the small pleasures of this day. Now she hates how good it feels to be alone in this car, to be moving fast and making so many bare, clear decisions with her own hands. She hates how good it feels to have straight hair and a new suit and a good sense of the best route. Today is better than yesterday, she insists. But today feels like it's broken open, and all she can want are the smallest, quickest things.